


Expiration

by caldefrance



Category: The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Anal Sex, Automatic Writing, Body Horror, Canon Temporary Character Death, Caregiver Exhaustion, Caretaking, Community: theoldguardkinkmeme, Dark, Depression, Dissociation, Grief, Halloween Special, Hand Feeding, Hand Jobs, Historical, Hypnosis, M/M, Macabre, Mistaken Identity, Necrophilia, PTSD, Shell Shock, Short Story, Touch-Starved, World War I
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-31
Updated: 2020-11-02
Packaged: 2021-03-08 20:54:14
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,280
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27243022
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/caldefrance/pseuds/caldefrance
Summary: Nicky thought that what he'd seen in the Great War—the so-called "war to end all wars"—had scarred him. He saw, too, that it had had a devastating effect on Joe. "Shell shock" was what the doctors were calling it: the dreadful nightmares that sapped the man he loved of so much of his energy and all his joy until he began to see himself as a ghoul trapped in a dead man's body. Nicky would agree to try anything to help the man who now believed his unending life was a curse—even hypnosis.
Relationships: Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova
Comments: 17
Kudos: 45





	1. Necrosis

**Author's Note:**

> This work was developed as a response to a prompt posted to theoldguardkinkmeme, which you can find here:  
> https://theoldguardkinkmeme.dreamwidth.org/5880.html?thread=1959928#cmt1959928
> 
> “One of them uses hypnosis on the other to put them in a state of complete suggestibility, to cleanse their mind, to turn them pretty much into a sex zombie. They can do whatever they please with their toy’s body and mind. It’s fully consensual, the hypnotized one craves to be blank and devoided of nothing but the prerogative to listen and obey.
> 
> “Just to clarify: it’s not forever, it’s just for this one session.”
> 
> I thought this idea could work well as a period piece—set in 1920, on the heels of World War I—because there was a surge of interest in spiritualism and in practises like séances and automatic writing then.
> 
> I can imagine that the traumatic experiences of the so-called "Great War" would have terrible effects on long-lived fighters like Joe and Nicky. I can imagine that they might feel disillusioned—like a lot of the poets and artists who were conscripted and fought in the war. I can even imagine that they might long for a bit of escapism promised by hypnotism: to feel like they're being moved by a greater power or "inspiration."
> 
> This "Hallowe'en"/"All Souls' Day" special indulges in some holiday-themed horror tropes like haunting and reanimated corpses and body horror to explore some dark subjects—PTSD, grief, depression, and recovery—and, of course, erotic hypnosis.

Nicky jerked awake when Joe started crying out. He moved quickly to the room where his lover slept apart from him, to soothe his crying before they woke any of their neighbours through the thin walls of their tenement apartment in Brooklyn.

" _Stavi sognando_ ," Nicky murmured, using a gentle and consoling tone of voice, to wake Joe from his recurring nightmares. "You were only dreaming, _tesoro_."

Joe continued to babble and cry hysterically, completely inconsolable. He was pleading with Nicoló, with death—begging for them to take him, too.

"It's safe here, Joe. You're safe here. I'm safe, too."

Two years ago, after the armistice was signed and their group had scattered to recover from experiences that no man should have survived, Nicky had insisted they move to Brooklyn—a borough of New York City where more and more immigrants like themselves were arriving to escape the desperate poverty and wreckage left by war in Europe. Nicky and Joe had moved from neighbourhood to neighbourhood like restless spirits, staying in a series of soulless bedsits and SROs, until they found this small two-room apartment in Carroll Gardens. Nicky had insisted they move to this section of Brooklyn, where each of the brownstone buildings was set back from the street and the front gardens planted with leafy oak and pear trees and with so many flowering plants. Nicky had hoped that they might find some measure of peace here, in a place that looked so different from the trenches and blasted landscapes of war-torn Belgium and France.

Nicky and Joe had fought together in the trenches and the dug-outs and the disputed wastelands between two stagnant armies, laying down life after life, to protect conscripted soldiers and unfortunate civilians alike from a bayonet or a bullet or a battery or a grenade or a mortar or a gas attack or a flame thrower or an assault or a sortie or a firing squad— _ad nauseam_. They had died in more gruesome and horrifying and painful ways in four years of total war than in all their previous experience fighting without dying. They were lucky enough to walk away from the Flander’s fields with only a poppy to show for their service, when other men lost their sight or their limbs or their life. They trusted their physical wounds would heal—an open wound, a dismemberment, or a burn would close—and abused their bodies to protect and defend others. They would come to understand their hubris much later when their psychological wounds—a traumatic memory, a recurring nightmare, an unfounded fear—only grew worse over time.

Nicky now watched on, helplessly, as Joe battled his own demons.

"It's safe here, Joe. You're safe here. I'm safe, too." Nicky repeated the words like a mantra, as though their repetition alone would convince him.

Eventually, Joe woke, staring at Nicky—a man he'd loved for a hundred lifetimes—with dead eyes.

"Will you take me to the graveyard?" Joe croaked, his voice thick with anguish.

"Why would you want to go there, my love?" Nicky asked, grieved by this frequent request of his.

"I want to find his grave. I want to join him there. Will you take me to find him?" Joe begged him.

"Whose grave do you want to find?" Nicky asked, despairing even as he humoured his request.

"Nicky," Joe cried out, overwhelmed by his wrenching grief. "His was called Nicoló di Genova and he was all that and more to me."

"Oh, Joe," Nicky cried, his voice breaking too. "I'm right here. Nicky is here with you. Come back to me, _tesoro_."

"No," Joe denied the truth with a vehemence that always took Nicky by surprise. "He died. He didn't come back and now I'm dead, too."

"No! My love," Nicky managed to say, between heaving sobs, as he gave in to his own feelings of despair. "I came back for you. I always came back. I need you to come back to me, now."

Nicky watched helplessly as Joe continued to ignore the evidence of his own eyes.

Nicky thought that what he'd seen in the Great War—the so-called "war to end all wars"—had scarred him. He saw, too, that it had had a devastating effect on Joe. "Shell shock" was what the doctors were starting to call it: the dreadful condition that sapped the man he loved so much of his energy and all his joy. Nicky had watched, helplessly, as Joe was tormented by traumatic memories that filled his sleep with nightmares and his waking hours with grief, until he began to see himself as a ghoul trapped in a dead man's body.

Joe spent his good days, when he recognized Nicky and his surroundings, haunting the apartment like a restless ghost. The bad days, when he believed Nicky was dead and lost to him, he spent lying in bed where he stared at nothing and refused to engage with any of his partner's attempts to revive him. 

Joe had not picked up a pen or a piece of charcoal since the armistice was signed and the war ended. Joe had squandered Nicky's efforts to replenish his supplies. Joe had destroyed all his materials and burned his sketchbooks, he said, for some light to keep the darkness at bay. Nicky had watched, powerlessly, as Joe destroyed years of work, unable to give him a good reason to stay his destructive impulses. 

Joe had not touched his lover with affection or intimacy for almost two years now. Joe had vehemently rejected Nicky’s attempts to touch him and offer him physical comfort. Joe had fought against his embrace like a man possessed. Nicky had watched him, horrified, as Joe had screamed himself hoarse about ghouls and dead bodies and necrotic flesh and curses.

Nicky and Joe's relationship had suffered from dry spells before, often when they separated for a time to pursue their mercenary work. Never before had they shared each other's company for so long and not reached out for comfort or relief—not since those first weeks they had known each other.

Nicky worried that Joe felt an even greater sense of despair now than when they had killed each other so many times in the crusades, when they believed themselves locked into a never-ending conflict.

Nicky imagined that, if their positions were reversed and he found himself suffering endlessly as Joe did, he might consider passing from the world of men. He would consider retiring to seek the peace and purpose offered by a monastery’s cloisters. He remembered reading in the local newspaper that one of the city’s wealthiest men planned to build a cloister at the northern tip of Manhattan. Nicky knew, though, that his lover would not find the same peace in sequestration and self-denial that he would.

Nicky felt helplessly impotent—as though he were only a shadow of himself, unable to move or console the man he loved—as though he might as well have died for all the good he could do for the man who grieved his death.

Nicky would try anything to help Joe—if only he had any idea of what to do.

Nicky had once tried to talk to Joe, to ask him about what he'd experienced. Nicky had mustered all his courage to ask about the dreams that interrupted his sleep so often.

When Joe dreamed, he remembered waking alone in the dark. Joe thought he remembered the shock of an explosion. Joe thought Nicky and, perhaps, another man had been standing at his side when the shell hit. When his wounds healed enough that he could bear to move, he remembered that was when he turned over and saw the body. The man's face was gone—the skin and bones had been destroyed beyond recognition—and any identifying features on his uniform had burned away. He remembered feeling the bottom of his world drop out. Was it Nicky? Was he dead? Was he even healing?

" _Destati, Nicoló_! Wake up!"

Joe remembered attempting an agonizing crawl across the room. Joe remembered feeling up and down the body with trembling hands, desperately searching for any signs of life returning. He remembered reaching for its face, recoiling when he felt how soft and wet the shattered remains were to the touch.

Joe remembered that he didn't recognize his lover's face. He remembered trying to recognize other parts of his lover's body—parts that he knew so well that would have been covered and protected by clothing.

Joe remembered rubbing his face with filthy hands, when he couldn't tell for sure, feeling how the blood and viscous matter smeared across his own dirty skin. Joe remembered how his face twisted with pain. He remembered giving into his despair, with a hoarse scream.

" _No! Per favore_! Joe pleaded, as his worst fear was realized before him. "Please, my love, don't be dead!"

Joe remembered the dead man remained still, unresponsive to his pleas.

" _Destati! Nicoló_! Don't be dead!" Joe had begged the dead man. "You promised me we'd survive this war! You promised me we would have peace! You _promised_ me you would never leave me!"

Joe remembered how it hurt him when the dead man refused to answer. He remembered that no amount of pleading, no amount of desperate appeals, would raise his lover from the dead or lift the curse of his unending life.

Joe remembered laying down beside the dead body and waiting for death to come for him, too.

Joe had been desperately confused when Nicky came for him, instead. It had taken hours for Nicky to heal enough from the explosion, so he could dig him out with a mangled shovel and the desperate strength of his own arms. 

When the shell had exploded, it blasted them in different directions: launching Nicky backwards into the exposed trench and burying Joe with an _aide-de-camp_ who had carried messages to and from their comrades André and Sébastien fighting in different sections of the line. When Nicky finally reached the collapsed dug-out, he found Joe keening over a dead man's body. 

Nicky had tried to explain what had happened in the blast, but Joe couldn't understand how he could have survived when he hadn't seen him heal. Nicky found he couldn't reason with Joe, in his traumatized state, to dispute his belief that they had both died as he waited, buried in that dark place.

Joe remained trapped in that dark place, where he suffered from feelings of grief and guilt without end. He thought he would never find peace. He thought he would never escape his worst nightmare. Joe still couldn't admit to what ghoulish things he'd done with that body in the depths of his despair—to Nicky or, even, to himself.

Joe had turned away from Nicky, then, and burdened them both with the oppressive weight of survivor's guilt.

Nicky had tried to cater to Joe's appetite, so he might keep up his strength as he did battle with his demons alone. Nicky feared that Joe was wasting away, letting his body atrophy so it might match his self-image—which he'd once vividly described as a ghoul that haunted necrotic remains.

"Shall I heat you some soup?" Nicky offered Joe, as he lay listlessly. "I think we have some sliced bread leftover. I could bring it to you?"

“Don’t trouble yourself for me, kind stranger,” Joe had refused him, confusing Nicky with some faceless orderly. “Don’t waste your food on a dead man. I’m for the undertaker.”

"How can it be a waste when I see a living man breathe before my eyes?"

Joe said nothing, turning his back to Nicky—effectively ending any conversation between them with his stiff body language.

Nicky dutifully went to heat some of the soup, one flavoured with tomatoes and oregano, with some stale bread toasted on the gas range. He brought the food to his lover's bedside and fed it to him with a spoon, with endless patience.

Nicky worried himself sick about what Joe might eat if there were no soup that he could heat for him. He would need to go to the grocer's on Atlantic ave, the one run by Gianni Loretto and his niece Carla after neither of his four sons returned from the war, so he could pick up more bread and another tin of the Campbell's soup. Would Joe even notice he'd gone? Would Joe leave if Nicky weren't here to keep him grounded? Would Nicky return to find him gone, vanished into thin air?

Joe’s lack of a response to Nicky’s attempts at taking care of him filled him with anxiety—with an unreasonable sense of unease about their fraying connection, their destiny, his place, his purpose. As Joe lost himself to his grief, overwhelmed by the memories of death that haunted him, Nicky exhausted himself with the business of caring for him through his periods of despondency.

Nicky had also tried to distract Joe, pushing him to leave the confines of their tenement apartment to go on small outings. Nicky wished to expose Joe to other things besides the oppressive silence that had fallen between them, so he might find some reason to keep from nursing his feelings of despair in isolation.

Nicky first managed to convince Joe to walk through Greenwood cemetery, a sprawling necropolis located nearby, so they could wander between the well-kept gravestones and mausoleums that dotted a landscape of rolling hills. Nicky hoped Joe would see that Greenwood cemetery looked so very different from what he could remember of the desolate battlefields of France: where the rural landscape had been carved up into trenches and artillery craters and mass graves, dotted with blackened trees. This time of year, at the end of October, the trees of Greenwood cemetery were aflame with leaves that changed colours from green to red and yellow and gold. The morning they went for a walk, a mist had blanketed the hills to give the necropolis a transporting air of mystery. Nicky watched Joe, surreptitiously, as he foraged for mushrooms to flavour their dinner. Nicky might have pressed him to speak and he might have admitted his fascination for these species which fed on dead matter. Nicky felt his heart seize in his chest when he saw Joe close his eyes and breathed in, his hardened deathmask cracking with the expression of something akin to good cheer, as the autumn shone on the washed-out skin of his face.

Nicky then convinced Joe to take in a silent film— _Dr Jekyll & Mr Hyde_, an adaptation of a story they had both enjoyed before the war—at a theatre located near Prospect Park. Nicky hoped that the gothic story of a man who sought to dissociate his terrible urges from his better self only to lose himself entirely might appeal to Joe's new-found interest in the macabre. When the theatre lights were dimmed, before the projectionist's light began to flash images on the screen, Nicky felt Joe reach out and clasp his hand in the darkness. Nicky felt so touch-starved, he could hardly breathe, lest he might spook him or break their connection. Nicky stared ahead, unseeing, as he imagined that the other man sought the comfort of his touch. Nicky couldn't remember anything from the film, only the wonderful sensation of Joe's hand in his for the first time in years.

Nicky finally convinced Joe to visit a branch of the Brooklyn Public Library. Nicky hoped Joe would discover new interests of his own to pursue there, without his constant prompting, in this quiet space filled with stacks and stacks of books. Nicky felt his heart race as he lost sight of him, for a moment, as Joe wandered off with his fingers brushing the spines of books on the shelves. Nicky had expected Joe would wander around without purpose for a while, as he usually did, before deciding to leave. Nicky was shocked, speechless, when he found Joe in the non-fiction section, instead, and stared as he pulled books on spiritualism off he shelves and flipped through them with an avid interest he’d not shown since before the war.

Thereafter, Joe began to leave their apartment without Nicky ever needing to convince him. Joe began to leave on his own and go haunt other places. Nicky could never muster the courage to ask where he went, as he felt so overwhelmed with gratitude that Joe showed any degree of interest in the outside world.

On the contrary, as Joe came to explore other places, Nicky withdrew from the world—exhausted as he lost his own extended battle with his unfettered anxiety. As Joe left the confines of their tenement apartment, Nicky worried and fretted obsessively that Joe would come home one day to find him gone or missing and suffer a relapse into despair and despondency. Nicky couldn’t let himself be responsible for Joe’s condition a second time. Nicky thought he needed to keep himself safe from the world for Joe.

“It’s safe here. Joe’s safe here. Nicky is safe, too.” Nicky repeated the words to himself when he was alone now, just below his breath, like a mantra.

Nicky found himself caught up in these compulsive thoughts, which drove him to haunt their shared spaces like a wraith or as nothing more than a shadow of himself. Nicky couldn’t see how Joe began to notice he had restricted his movements even as he pushed the other man to expand his horizons.

One day, Joe came home to Nicky. Joe found Nicky in their tiny kitchen, tending to a pot of mushroom _ragú_ like a benevolent domestic spirit. When Joe caught Nicky's expectant gaze, he tried to break the silence that had grown between them.

"I want you to hypnotize me."


	2. Hypnosis

Nicky stared at Joe, shocked into speechlessness, after he had dropped his bombshell announcement. After months of painful silence, Nicky was taken by surprise when Joe announced his desire to be hypnotized.

Joe pulled out a chair for him at the kitchen table and they sat, facing each other, as he tried to find the words to explain his reasoning.

“I want—” Joe started to say, then interrupted himself, already lost for words.

Everything he had read about hypnotic states and trances and suggestibility filled his mind, but he was still searching for the right words that would convince the other man to try this with him.

Joe stared at the gap between their hands, as they sat across from each other, like two opposing armies caught in an unbreakable stalemate over a stretch of no-man’s-land. He so longed to close the gap, to reach out and touch the other man’s arm. He did not trust himself enough to think he could do so without also remembering how it felt to touch the other man’s corpse. He still remembered so vividly how the corpse had yielded to his touch, as he’d sought the comfort of a familiar body in his grief—befouling his hands and body with necrotic scum and tainting his memories with death.

Joe focused again on the living man before him and tried to block out his disgusting thoughts. Joe knew that Nicky had given himself over to his care when he wasn’t able to care for himself. Joe knew that Nicky deserved more than he could give him—broken and polluted as he was. Joe knew he needed to focus on reconnecting with the living man before him and not fixate on the dreadful things he’d done in a past life.

Joe mustered all of his soldier’s courage, once more, and tried to explain himself.

“I am so grateful to you,” Joe said, starting over, “for everything that you have tried and done to help me.”

“ _Prego_.”

Joe shook his head, refusing Nicky’s polite response. It would be too easy to write off the strength and perseverance the man had shown while caring for him. “I have been so lost and so weak since the war ended. I have come to rely on your strength to carry me through the darkest days of my life.”

Nicky said nothing, as he felt overwhelmed by Joe’s sincere expression of gratitude.

Joe swallowed back his own overwhelming feelings, and continued his speech. “I am worried, though, that there is a gap growing between us that never existed before.”

When Nicky said nothing in response, Joe found he couldn’t bear to see the expression on his face and so he focused at his hands when he spoke again.

“I don’t think I can bear the thought of touching you or being touched by you in return,” Joe confessed, disheartened by his own debility. “I find memories of your death—though it was only a terrible misunderstanding—still plague me and fill me with horror.”

Nicky was crying, so very quietly, so as not to interrupt him.

“I also think that I am starting to lose you,” Joe said, as he continued. “I can see how you’ve started to withdraw into yourself. I hardly ever see you leave the apartment any more. I hardly ever hear you speak about your day. I worry that you’re losing your voice.”

Nicky was now crying openly, showing little control over the pain and heartbreak he’d nursed in private for months.

Joe tried to reach out and console him then, only to hesitate and stop himself before he could touch the other man.

“I thought we could try hypnosis,” Joe said, at last. “You could practise using your voice again and I could learn to find comfort in your touch again. Everything that I have read suggests that you could induce me into a state of complete suggestibility—something that would wipe the thoughts from my mind and override my inhibitions—and help us reconnect again. I want you to turn my diseased mind into a blank slate, free from any other compulsion but to listen and obey your voice. I’ve felt so overcome by anguish and distress for so long, that I yearn with all my heart to feel intimacy with you again. I think if you hypnotized me, if you shaped my will to your will, I could even feel inspired—moved—again. I would give anything to feel that way again.”

Nicky agreed that he would try this for Joe.

Nicky set himself to this task with the enthusiasm and zeal of a religious convert or with the desperation of a dehydrated traveller spying a desert oasis—both feelings with which he had become familiar with in his long life. Nicky dedicated all his energy to studying the books and manuals and newspaper clippings that Joe had uncovered in his reading on spiritualism. Nicky devoted his days to writing scripts, to induce a hypnotic trance, with repetitive phrases and simple orders and repeated praises. Nicky spent hours practising his deliver—speaking in a soothing, sleep-inducing monotone that he had first learned for church services—that he felt sure would induce passivity and boredom in the listener. Nicky collected supplies and studied for weeks until he felt he was ready to try to hypnotize a willing subject.

Nicky set a blank sheet of paper and a pencil down on the table, across from his seat, and invited Joe to join him.

When Joe sat across from him, Nicky began to speak slowly and monotonously as though he were conducting a religious rite. 

“Focus on the sheet of paper I’ve placed before you,” Nicky instructed Joe. “Focus on the sheet and as you stare at it, feel yourself start to relax.”

Nicky watched Joe stare down at the table, counting his breaths, and waited for a sign that he was following his instructions.

“Focus on the sheet in front of you and as you stare at the blank page, try to relax your breathing. Keep your eyes fixed on the sheet of paper, right at the centre of the blank page, and listen carefully to my instructions. Listen to the sound of my voice and you will find that you want to drift down into a relaxed state.”

Nicky watched Joe stare at the sheet, without blinking, as he followed his instructions.

“Keep your eyes fixed on the sheet of paper and take a deep breath in and hold it. Just like that. Let it out slowly, now. As you exhale, feel how your muscles start to grow loose and relax. Take another breath. Take a deep breath in, inhale, and release it slowly, exhale. As you expirate, feel how all the tension flows from your body. Once more, take a deep breath in and then expirate, and feel how your body relaxes even more as you breathe out.”

Nicky watched Joe, as he breathed slowly and followed his instructions.

“You’re doing so well, Joe. As you continue to stare at the piece of paper and take deep breaths, start to feel the heavy weight of your body. Feel the heavy weight of your arms as they rest on the table. As you focus on the piece of paper, you can feel how your arms become heavier and heavier. You can move if you need to, but every time you take a deep breath your arms feel heavier and heavier and harder to move. You can rest against your arms now, and as you take another deep breath, feel your body sinking deeper into a state of relaxation.”

Nicky watched Joe, as he slumped forward over his arms that rested against the surface of the table and followed his instructions.

“You’re doing so well, Joe. I now want you to imagine there is a string wrapped around your wrist, and no matter how hard you try, you have to follow the string wherever it moves your arm. I want you to use your imagination so that you think you can feel the tension of the string and when it moves, it moves your arm. Try to move your arm while the string is slack, Joe, and you’ll find that you can’t.”

Nicky watched Joe, as he concentrated on his arms where they rested against the table and followed his instructions.

“You can stop trying now, and let the tension drain from your arms and let your body relax even more.”

Nicky watched Joe, as lines of tension around his eyes relaxed.

“You’re doing so well, Joe. You’ll find that every thing I tell you to do simply makes you feel more relaxed and open and ready to follow all of my instructions. I’m going to move the string that’s directing your arm in just a moment. When I do, I want you to pick up the pencil on the table next to the sheet of paper and grip in loosely in your hand. Nod if you understand what I’m asking you to do, Joe.”

Nicky watched Joe, as he nodded and followed his instructions.

“Good, that’s good, Joe. I want you to imagine that the string wrapped around your wrist is now stretched taught, and that no matter how hard you try, you have to lift your arm and follow it. Follow the string with your arm, Joe, as it moves over the pencil and it moves over the sheet of paper. Keep your grip relaxed, just like that. I want you to focus again on the sheet of paper, now. When the string directs your arm to move again, I want you to move your hand holding the pencil over the sheet of paper. Nod if you understand what I’m asking from you, Joe.”

Nicky watched Joe, as he nodded and followed his instructions.

“You’re doing so well, Joe. I want you to feel the stiff length of the writing tool in your grip and imagine the end of the tool scratching against the sheet of paper. When the string directs your arm to move again, I want you to move the pencil over the sheet of paper. Keep your hand nice and relaxed and let the string direct your movements. I want you to concentrate on how it feels as the string directs your hand to move the pencil across the paper. Can you feel how the string is moving you to write lines on the sheet of paper? Can you feel how automatic the movement feels? Can you feel how little control you have over your movements as the string inspires you to write lines on the piece of paper?”

Nicky watched Joe, as he concentrated on the automatic movements of his hand and followed his instructions.

“You’re doing so well, Joe. I want you to relax now and let the string direct your hand to move to the side once more and let its weight rest against the table again.”

Nicky watched Joe, as he let his arm drop stiffly against the surface of the table and followed his instructions.

“You did so well, Joe. I want you to remember this feeling, how relaxed and peaceful you feel as you listen to the sound of my voice. I want you to take deep breaths, in and out, and as you breathe slowly I want you to remember how you can return to this deep state of relaxation again.”

Nicky watched Joe, as he breathed deeply and followed his instructions.

“That’s good, Joe. I want you to begin to feel like you have full control of your arms again. I want you to feel like you have full control of your body when I ask you how you feel. How do you feel, Joe?”

Nicky watched Joe, as he blinked and took a shaky breath.

Joe stared at the lines he’d traced on the page, confused, as though he thought that deciphering the illegible figures might give him the words he needed to describe feelings that he’d been repressing for a long time.

“I feel—I don’t know how I feel,” Joe mumbled, uncertain.

Nicky nodded, accepting that a single session would never have resolved the emotional strain that had driven a gap between them. 

They agreed that they would need to repeat the experience before they could decide whether it was helping either of them reconnect.

Nicky purchased candles for their next session and Joe watched him light one, before he was invited to join him again at the table.

“I want you to focus on the flame and feel yourself start to relax,” Nicky instructed Joe.

Joe stared at the tall flame, focusing on the way the light hardly moved in the still air of their apartment.

“I want you to focus all your attention on the flame,” he heard Nicky say. “All you have to do is listen to the sound of my voice and you’ll find it so easy to return to that same relaxed state as before. Just keep your eyes on the flame, right at the centre where the wick is burning, and listen carefully to my instructions.”

Joe listened to Nicky’s instructions, as he focused his gaze on the flame placed before him, and let his mind empty of all the thoughts that had preoccupied him earlier that day. Joe only needed to listen and to follow instructions.

Joe hardly acknowledged the specific instructions he was given, to slow and control his breathing, though he felt how each breath drove him to a deeper and more passive state of relaxation. Joe felt his shoulders slump forward, as he continued to breathe and follow instructions. 

Joe felt his eyes flutter, when he was instructed to feel the tired and heavy weight of his eyelids. Joe felt his eyelids close, when he was bid to close his eyes. Joe felt so relaxed, as he waited for further instructions.

Joe felt a light puff of air, as the flame he had been asked to focus on was blown out.

“You’re doing so well, Joe. I want you to imagine that your eyelids are sealed shut and no matter how hard you try, you won’t be able to open them again. No matter how hard you try, your eyes stay sealed tightly shut. If you really need to, you can open your eyes again, but I want you to keep your eyes shut for me. Try to open your eyes now, Joe, and you’ll find that you can’t.”

Joe tried to open his eyes, as he was bid, and Joe tried to keep his eyes shut, as he was instructed. Joe couldn’t move or speak or disobey. Joe couldn’t decide how to follow the contradictory instructions.

“You can stop trying now, Joe, and let the tension drain from your face. Take another deep breath and release it, and feel your muscles relax twice as much as before. I’m going to ask you to give me full control of your arms in just a moment, but everything I tell you to do simply makes you feel more relaxed and open and willing to follow my instructions.”

Joe had forgotten he’d been made with arms. Joe wasn’t sure where they were. Joe trusted the voice would help him find his body. Joe couldn’t move his body as he waited for his instructions.

“You’re doing so well, Joe. I want you to keep your eyes shut, no matter what I ask you to do. I want you to give me full control of your arm, letting it move as I tell you to move.”

Joe could give the voice all the control. Joe didn’t feel in control of anything, let alone of his arm.

“I am going to place my hand on the table between us,” the voice said. “When I tell you, I want you to reach out with your hand and touch it. I want you to reach out with your hand in front of you and touch my hand.”

Joe felt his hand move, involuntarily, to reach out before him and find the hand waiting on the table. Joe gave a small shudder as he touched it. Joe felt he should recoil from the sensation of touching a dead thing and yet he felt compelled to follow his instructions.

“You’re doing so well, Joe. I want you to feel the skin of my hand with your fingers. Can you feel how warm it feels? Can you feel how soft it feels? Can you feel how alive it feels?”

Joe followed his instructions and felt the hand with his hand. Joe could feel the warmth and the softness and the vigour of the hand with his hand.

“Can you nod if you like how it feels?”

Joe nodded, as he found he liked the feeling of the hand in his hand.

“Good, that’s very good, Joe. I am going to lean in towards you, now. When I tell you, I want you to reach out with your hand and touch my face. I want you to reach with your hands in front of you, without looking, and touch my face.”

Joe felt his hands extend before him, without having ordered them to, and reach out to touch the face before him. Joe felt the contours of the face with trembling hands. Joe felt the face move through his fingers as he listened to his instructions.

“You’re doing so well, Joe. I want you to feel the my face with your fingers now. Can you feel how it moves? Can you feel how alive it feels? Can you nod if you recognize it from your memories?”

Joe nodded, as he touched his lover’s face and followed his instructions.

“Good, that’s very good, Joe. I am now going to take your hands in my hands and bring them down to rest against the table. When I rest our hands against the table, I want you to open your eyes and take full control of your body. You won’t need to move or pull away, just let them stay relaxed against the surface of the table, and let yourself wake again from this deep state of relaxation.”

Joe opened his eyes, when he felt his lover lower his hands against the table. Joe stared at the way their fingers were clasped between their bodies. Joe felt tears of relief blur his vision. Joe felt relief as he enjoyed the feeling of his lover’s touch without feeling an overwhelming sense of disgust as he had feared.  
“How do you feel, Joe?” Nicky asked, with concern when he saw his tears.

“I feel purged,” Joe said, once he’d found his voice again. “I want to try this again,” he begged him. “Make me touch you—all of you. I want you to free me from all my other fears with the awful power of your voice.”

Nicky began to cry, too. “I would do anything—try anything—so you might find comfort once again in our intimacy.”

“Next time,” Joe requested, “make me—no, command me—to do whatever you please with my body.”

Nicky purchased incense for their next session and Joe watched him light it and fill the bedroom with smoke before he was invited to join him.

“I want you to close your eyes, Joe. I want you to take a deep breath, inhale and exhale. I want you to breathe in and focus on the smell of incense. Let it overwhelm your senses until all that you smell is the sweet smell of incense. I want you to focus on that smell alone, as you breathe in and out, and feel yourself relax. Again. Breathe in the incense and exhale it, slowly, until all you can think about is the smell of incense. Breathe it in, again. Breathe in and exhale, and as you do, feel yourself return to the deep state of relaxation we have been practising.”

Joe breathed in and exhaled, slowly, and closed his eyes as he followed his instructions. He felt his mind return to the blank state he’d remembered from their previous sessions. He felt the blank feeling overwhelm all his other thoughts and desires and senses and perceptions. He felt he no longer needed to listen to his instructions, to follow them. He felt his body respond to the voice, to move, without conscious thought or interest. He felt entirely free from the burden of expectation or capacity or desire. He felt free to follow his instructions, as he received and responded to simple orders—treating each one as a discrete movement, disconnected from all the others.

Joe nodded, in response to a question he didn’t care to hear or remember. Joe had placed all his trust in the voice and it had full control of his body, now.

Joe felt his hands reach out and touch something unfamiliar. Joe felt his hands feel the fabric of a shirt and felt his hands move to lift the shirt by its hem. Joe felt his hands then return to feel bared skin, as his hands followed the contours of a chest and shoulders and nipples and navel. Joe felt his hands brush the hair that grew between the navel and groin before his hands moved to cup something soft and yielding beneath the cover of more clothing. 

Joe felt his hands work a button and the fastener of a zipper to release engorging flesh from the confines of stiff clothing. Joe felt his hands grab hold of the throbbing flesh of a penis which lengthened and stiffened in his loose grip. Joe felt his hand stroke and squeeze and raise the cock until it came alive in his grip.

“Your hand feels so very good, _tesoro_.”

Joe felt his other hand move to reach inside the tight confines of clothing and grope until it found the furled perineum of an arsehole. Joe felt one of his fingers breach the tight perineum. Joe felt as first one finger then two work and stretch the arsehole.

“I’m ready, _tesoro_. I want you to touch your own body now. I want you to free your cock from your pants and I want you to stimulate it until it is so stiff and throbbing. I want you to prepare your body to take me. I want you to hear all the noises that you can wring from me when you impale me with your cock.”

Joe felt his hands guide his cock to breach the stretched anus and push through the tightness of the anal canal. Joe felt his hips jerk and thrust and his breathing speed up to match the pace of his body’s exertions. Joe felt the body beneath him writhe and moan and respond to him as his body moved. Joe felt his own pleasure overwhelm his senses as his body reached its climax and then shrink back from the over-sensitivity that followed an orgasm.

“That felt so incredible. I'm amazed at how well you performed for me, my love. I am going to wrap my arms around you and embrace you against my chest. When I ask you how you feel, I want you to open your eyes and take full control of your body as you wake from a deep state of relaxation. How do you feel, Joe?”

Joe opened his eyes, and saw how he lay against the bare skin of Nicky’s chest. Joe felt the warmth and movement of his lover’s chest, and basked in the feeling of simply being held after so long.

“I feel satisfied,” Joe sighed, as he sank deeper into Nicky’s embrace. Joe heaved a small sob that might also have been a relieved chuckle. “I felt none of the things I used to feel as you made me touch you. I now feel so relieved that I could even touch you intimately again.”

“I love you, Joe,” Nicky gasped, no longer able to maintain a stranglehold on all his feelings. “I love you so much.” Nicky cried out, releasing emotions he now he no longer needed to maintain the dispassionate tone of voice required for hypnosis.

“I love you, too,” Joe said, echoing him. “When you hypnotized me, I felt you reach past all the barriers I’d erected in my mind and felt you reconnect with my soul.”

“I know. You asked me to reach out to you with my voice and bare your soul so it could recognize my own again.”

“I did, didn’t I?”

“We are _anime gemelle_ —soul mates—linked in death and life,” Nicky said, fervently. “I could not let death take you while we still lived and breathed. I would do anything—absolutely anything—to help you remember that.”

“Would you hypnotize me again?” Joe asked him, though he suspected he already knew the answer.

“Of course, Joe. I said that I would do anything you asked of me.”

“I have come to crave the feeling,” Joe said, admitting then that his desires hadn’t only been therapeutic. “I want to feel like a toy or a fiddle for you to play with. I really enjoyed it each time you asked me to give up all control of my body to you, so I could satisfy your desires.”

“Oh, Joe. If you wish for me to hypnotize you each time we touch each other, I would do that for you. I will recite every hymn, every missal that I have memorized until you find yourself wishing you could abdicate your capacity to think altogether and turn into one of those zombie creatures created to satisfy all of my obscene thoughts and desires.”

Joe laughed, a short raucous bark that neither of them had heard since before the dreadful business of the war began, when he realized that Nicky was teasing him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you too, dear reader, found some joy and comfort in the way Joe & Nicky were able to reconnect after so much suffering. There were more than a few times, as I tried to re-write this draft, that I felt the same way Joe felt when he saw the completely illegible fragments of automatic writing Nicky helped him produce.
> 
> Thank you for reading all the way through to the end!


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